We Will
Remember
Them
Saturday 1st November 2014
Queens’ College Chapel, Cambridge
In aid of the Poppy Appeal
and Queens’ music
Founded by graduates from Cambridge chapel choirs, the Godwine Choir was set up
to capture the atmosphere of chamber music at university and bring it to London as
part of professional life.
The group is comprised of twenty-five young singers who rehearse together weekly at
the church of St George the Martyr in Borough. The choir specialises in a capella music
from the 20th and 21st century; they have recently performed works by a number of
contemporary composers, such as Gabriel Jackson. Future plans include performances
in several London venues, a recital in Buckfast Abbey and a tour to the Amalfi coast.
This evening we present a reflective sequence of music and readings for All Souls' Day.
We especially remember all those who lost their lives in the Great War.
Find out more about us at godwinechoir.org
PROGRAMME
When David Heard | Thomas Tomkins
Reading: Anthem for Doomed Youth, by Wilfred Owen
Heraclitus | Charles Villiers Stanford
Lay a Garland | Robert Pearsall
Reading: Remember, by Christina Rossetti
Valiant-for-Truth | Ralph Vaughan Williams
Greater Love | John Ireland
Reading: Lament, by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
And I Saw A New Heaven | Edgar Bainton
Geistliches Lied | Johannes Brahms
Reading: Drummer Hodge, by Thomas Hardy
Lord, Thou hast been Our Refuge | Ernest Walker
My Soul, There is a Country | Charles Hubert Hastings Parry
Reading: Ecclesiastes, Ch. 3, v. 1-8
For the Fallen | Douglas Guest
Bring us, O Lord God | William Henry Harris
Reading: A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning, by John Donne
Justorum Animae | Gabriel Jackson
When David Heard
Thomas Tomkins
When David heard that Absalom was slain
he went up to his chamber over the gate and wept;
and thus he said: O my son, my son, Absalom my son,
would God I had died for thee, O Absalom my son.
Anthem for Doomed Youth
Wilfred Owen
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
Heraclitus
Charles Villiers Stanford
They told me, Heraclitus, they told me you were dead;
They brought me bitter news to hear and bitter tears to shed;
I wept, as I remembered, how often you and I
Had tired the sun with talking, and sent him down the sky.
And now that thou art lying, my dear old Carian guest,
A handful of grey ashes, long, long ago at rest,
Still are thy pleasant voices, thy nightingales, awake;
For Death, he taketh all away, but them he cannot take.
Lay a Garland
Robert Pearsall
Lay a garland on her hearse
Of dismal yew.
Maidens, willow branches wear,
Say she died true.
Her love was false, but she was firm
Upon her buried body lie
lightly, thou gentle earth.
Remember
Christina Rossetti
Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.
Valiant-for-Truth
Ralph Vaughan Williams
After this it was noised abroad that Mister Valiant-for-truth was taken with a summons
and had this for a token that the summons was true, ‘That his pitcher was broken at the
fountain’. When he understood it, he called for his friends, and told them of it. Then said
he, “I am going to my Father’s, and though with great difficulty I am got hither, yet now
I do not repent me of all the trouble I have been at to arrive where I am. My sword I
give to him that shall succeed me in my pilgrimage, and my courage and skill to him
that can get it. My marks and scars I carry with me, to be a witness for me that I have
fought his battles who now will be my rewarder.” When the day that he must go hence
was come, many accompanied him to the riverside, into which as he went he said,
“Death, where is thy Sting?” And as he went down deeper he said, “Grave, where is thy
Victory?” So he passed over, and all the trumpets sounded for him on the other side.
Greater Love
John Ireland
Many waters cannot quench love,
neither can the floods drown it. Love is strong as death.
Greater love hath no man than this,
that a man lay down his life for his friends.
Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree,
That we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness.
Ye are washed, ye are sanctified,
ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus.
Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation;
That ye should show forth the praises of him
who hath call’d you out of darkness into his marvellous light.
I beseech you brethren, by the mercies of God,
that you present your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy,
acceptable unto to God, which is your reasonable service.
Lament
Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
We who are left, how shall we look again
Happily on the sun or feel the rain
Without remembering how they who went
Ungrudgingly and spent
Their lives for us loved, too, the sun and rain?
A bird among the rain-wet lilac sings –
But we, how shall we turn to little things
And listen to the birds and winds and streams
Made holy by their dreams,
Nor feel the heart-break in the heart of things?
And I Saw A New Heaven
Edgar Bainton
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth:
for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away;
and there was no more sea.
And I, John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem,
coming down from God out of heaven,
prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
And I heard a great voice out of Heaven, saying,
Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men,
and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people,
and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes;
and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying,
neither shall there be any more pain:
for the former things are passed away.
Geistliches Lied
Johannes Brahms
Laß dich nur nichts nicht dauren mit Trauren,
sei stille, wie Gott es fügt,
so sei vergnügt mein Wille!
Do not be sorrowful or regretful;
Be calm, as God has ordained,
and thus my will shall be content.
Was willst du heute sorgen auf morgen?
Der Eine steht allem für,
der gibt auch dir das Deine.
Why worry today about tomorrow?
There is One who stands above all
who gives you, too, what is yours.
Sei nur in allem Handel ohn Wandel,
steh feste, was Gott beschleußt,
das ist und heißt das Beste.
Amen.
Only be steadfast in all you do,
stand firm; what God has decided,
that is and must be the best.
Amen.
Drummer Hodge
Thomas Hardy
They throw in Drummer Hodge, to rest
Uncoffined – just as found:
His landmark is a kopje-crest
That breaks the veldt around:
And foreign constellations west
Each night above his mound.
Young Hodge the drummer never knew –
Fresh from his Wessex home –
The meaning of the broad Karoo,
The Bush, the dusty loam,
And why uprose to nightly view
Strange stars amid the gloam.
Yet portion of that unknown plain
Will Hodge for ever be;
His homely Northern breast and brain
Grow to some Southern tree,
And strange-eyed constellations reign
His stars eternally.
Lord, Thou Hast Been Our Refuge
Ernest Walker
Lord, thou hast been our refuge from one generation to another.
Before the mountains were brought forth
or ever the earth and the world were made,
Thou art God from everlasting and world without end.
Thou turnest man to destruction; again Thou sayest:
Come again, ye children of men.
For a thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday;
seeing that is past as a watch in the night.
As soon as thou scatterest them, they are even as asleep,
and fade away suddenly like the grass.
In the morning it is green and groweth up,
but in the evening it is cut down and withered.
For when thou art angry, all our days are gone,
we bring our years to an end, as a tale that is told.
My Soul, There is a Country
Charles Hubert Hastings Parry
My soul, there is a country
Far beyond the stars,
Where stands a wingèd sentry
All skilful in the wars:
If thou canst get but thither,
There grows the flow'r of Peace,
The Rose that cannot wither,
Thy fortress and thy ease.
There, above noise and danger
Sweet Peace sits crowned with smiles
And One, born in a manger
Commands the beauteous files.
Leave then thy foolish ranges,
For none can thee secure
But One who never changes,
Thy God, thy life, thy cure.
He is thy gracious friend,
And, O my soul, awake!
Did in pure love descend
To die here for thy sake.
Ecclesiastes, Ch. 3, v. 1-8
There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
2
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
3
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
4
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
5
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
6
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
7
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
8
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
1
For The Fallen
Douglas Guest
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
Bring us, O Lord God
William Henry Harris
Bring us, O Lord God, at our last awakening into the house and gate of heaven, to enter
into that gate and dwell in that house, where there shall be no darkness nor dazzling,
but one equal light; no noise nor silence, but one equal music; no fears nor hopes, but
one equal possession; no ends nor beginnings, but one equal eternity, in the habitation
of thy glory and dominion, world without end. Amen.
A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne
As virtuous men pass mildly away,
And whisper to their souls to go,
Whilst some of their sad friends do say
The breath goes now, and some say, No:
Our two souls therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,
Like gold to airy thinness beat.
So let us melt, and make no noise,
No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move;
'Twere profanation of our joys
To tell the laity our love.
If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two;
Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the other do.
Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears,
Men reckon what it did, and meant;
But trepidation of the spheres,
Though greater far, is innocent.
And though it in the center sit,
Yet when the other far doth roam,
It leans and hearkens after it,
And grows erect, as that comes home.
Dull sublunary lovers' love
(Whose soul is sense) cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
Those things which elemented it.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must,
Like th' other foot, obliquely run;
Thy firmness makes my circle just,
And makes me end where I begun.
But we by a love so much refined,
That our selves know not what it is,
Inter-assured of the mind,
Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.
Justorum Animae
Gabriel Jackson
Justorum animae in manu Dei sunt,
et non tanget illos tormentum mortis.
Visi sunt oculis insipientium mori,
illi autem sunt in pace.
The souls of the just are in the hand of God,
the torment of death shall not touch them.
In the sight of the unwise they seemed to die;
but they are at peace.
CHOIr
Soprano
Hannah Bell *
Alto
Jo Hale
Sophie Hopkins
Sophie Henstridge
Helen Hugh-Jones
Grace Howson
Libby Phippard
Helena Jaeggi
Emily Tidbury
Julia Nikolic
Ellen Reading
Pippa Winstanley
Tenor
James Corbett
Bass
Adrian Ball *
Alex Davan Wetton
Hugh Collins *
Jamie Hodgson
Richard Pelmore
Edward Hughes
William Robertson
Travis Winstanley
Stefan Ward-Caddle
Alex Ying
David Young
*Soloists
Conductors: Edward Hughes and Alex Davan Wetton
OUR THANKS
We would like to thank Revd Tim Harling for allowing us to
perform in Queens’ College Chapel, and the St Margaret’s
Society for supporting this concert.